Paper’s spending spree is old news

The Irish Times is struggling with falling revenues but its managing director insists lower costs and charging for digital content will help it turn the page

Kavanagh refuses to rule out further restructuring (Fergal Phillips)
It had to be coaxed out of him, but it is probably the closest to a mea culpa
that critics of The Irish Times’s lavish boom-time expansion strategy will
ever get from Liam Kavanagh, the newspaper’s managing director.

When asked whether he regretted deals such as the €40m purchase of property
website Myhome.ie at the peak of the market, the laid-back Dubliner said:
“Hindsight is a wonderful thing.”

Along with most media companies, the Irish Times is struggling against the
recession, and it has made 100 staff redundant. This month, it will post
further losses for 2009, following a €37m loss for 2008, while sales fell
last year by 25% to about €95m.

Kavanagh, a no-nonsense accountant, was the paper’s finance chief for nine
years before taking the top job in February, after the departure of his
predecessor, Maeve Donovan. He previously spent eight years with KPMG,
followed by a